Complaints are coming in to the Trimet office by the hundreds about operator "misdeeds", most notably running red lights.
I'm not sure if the management is aware of it but with each silly complaint that comes in and routed to the individual another operators morale goes down the tubes.
Any experienced bus driver will tell you that it is IMPOSSIBLE to stop at every single red light that they encounter during a work shift.
On the west side there are no walk light countdown clocks and many signals wont change for quite awhile even after the walk light has stopped flashing.
This sets up a situation that forces bus operators to frequently run yellows, some of which might actually turn red before the bus is all the way through the intersection, technically a violation.
Making a fast stop is more hazardous than going through an intersection as stopping quickly causes passengers on the bus to fall and other consequences.
We operators are between a rock and a hard place nowadays, a blood thirsty public that has been prodded by the vampires of the mainstream press and a weak kneed management that finds it easier to blame its drivers than understanding the problem as we do!
3 comments:
I know a certain bus driver who used to run the 92 a couple years ago. When driving on Beaverton-Hillsdale Highway she literally drove prepared to stop at every light.
Of course, this meant nearly coming to a stop at GREEN lights.
Now fortunately for her, the schedule was so freakin' padded - not to mention she wasn't tied to a timepoint past Progress - so it didn't seem to bother anyone. But imagine an Operator doing this on the 12 line, where there is NO schedule padding and it's extremely difficult to maintain the schedule except in absolutely perfect (i.e. non-existent traffic, like what you'd see on Christmas Day.)
TriMet already has the capability, through the Opticom system, to rectify this. The problem is that TriMet has turned it off for unknown reasons. Why can't the system be engaged so that if a bus is within a city block of a traffic signal, it gets a GREEN light (not hold the yellow signal an "extra second or two")?
Erik, how do you know it is turned off?
TriMet Fact Sheet, and I believe a Q&A says its used.
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